1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a control method and apparatus for controlling devices existing in arbitrary places, such as domestic devices or OA devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
So-called home robots or servers have been proposed as control apparatuses for controlling domestic devices including home appliances. Most conventional control apparatuses for domestic devices perform one-way control of the devices, using, for example, a robot with an infrared remote control function, as is described in, for example, document 1 (“Internet Compatible Robot: MARON-1”, Fujitsu Journal, July, 2003, vol. 54, No. 4, pp. 285-292). Recently, however, so-called intelligent home appliances, which are connected to home networks and can check and control the states of home devices, have been researched and developed, thereby realizing more accurate control.
As home network schemes, protocols, such as Echonet (trademark) and universal plug-and-play (UPnP), have been proposed. Home robots or home servers detect home appliances in accordance with such protocols, and check or control their states. For instance, a home robot can activate an air conditioner in response to a user's voice request “Turn on the air conditioner”, or can perform surveillance in response to an alarm raised by a crime-prevention sensor.
Further, document 2 (Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2000-224670) discloses a home controller for controlling home appliances, in which the position of a user can be utilized as a control rule. For example, this controller can change the power-on time of an air conditioner in accordance with a change in the homecoming time of the user.
The above-mentioned home network protocols can only discriminate, for instance, the types of home appliances. To activate home appliances or carry out surveillance in response to the detection of an abnormality, it is necessary for the user to register, for instance, the locations of the air conditioner and crime-prevention sensor in relation to a map of the house stored in the robot. It is also necessary for the user to set, for example, which air conditioner should be activated when the voice request “Turn on the air conditioner” is issued, or to set which action program should be taken when the crime-prevention sensor generates an alarm.
Accordingly, in the case of the conventional home robot, when the user moves, along with the home robot, from the house to another place, such as their parents' house or country home, they must perform the above-described setting concerning the robot before moving. After the user moves from the house to another place, the to-be-controlled air conditioner, for example, is changed, therefore the correspondence between the map and home appliances set in the robot must be changed.
Further, the setting as to whether a certain behavior program should be executed may change even in the same situation. For instance, at home, the user may want the home robot to issue a message that washing has finished, whereas at their parents' house, they may not need the message. It is very troublesome if the user must perform a setting change whenever, for example, they move from one house to another house.
In light of the above, the prevent invention aims to provide a device control method and apparatus for easily realizing automatic changes in setting related to the control of devices when the control apparatus is carried from one place to another.